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“Whether it was the hand of God or whether this woman in the [airport] just said,‘Let her go by’, I [left] the customs area out into the lobby with the €16,700.

“I would never do that again. It all got spent.”

The documentary – Edna O’Brien: Fearful And Fearless – also features Live Aid legend Bob Geldof who says he wasn’t surprised the 88-year-old risked her life.

He added: “When she sees a grotesque atrocity like what happened to young girls in northern Nigeria, immediately she’s on alert, puts on her knapsack and hiking boots and off she goes. This would be absolute grist to her mill.”

O’Brien’s 18th novel Girl is a harrowing portrayal of a young victim snatched by Islamic terrorists.

She said: “It was the doctors, the trauma experts, the NGOs and the nurses who told me some of the more awful detail.

Boko Haram shares video of kidnapped Nigerian girls (Image: Reuters)

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“I did ask, ‘Why would I say to myself there and then that I have to write that book?

"Why would I go to Nigeria twice to write a book about material that, to put it mildly, is horrific unless I wanted to go into the zone of hell and yet believe I can come out? "I was fearful and fearless.”

Also in the documentary, the author’s sons Sasha and Carlo recall entertaining some of the most famous stars in the world during the heady days of her legendary gatherings in London in the 1970s and 80s.

Carlo said: “The parties were very large and raucous in a good way, maybe 100 people, 50 certainly.

“We would serve the alcohol, we would be sent to top up people’s glasses.”